Author: PCT

Yes, it is true. It’s been a while since I have posted on here. A lot has changed since my last post about how I was introduced into construction. First off, well, I am getting married! Lisa and I have set a date for September 23rd to be married in New Zealand in her hometown of Hamilton. We are both very excited, words can’t express how much we much love each other. So lately we have both been very busy with the planning side of the wedding, which is actually very stressful for some reason. So this post will probably be short and long lived before I get around to posting another article.

I am also selling my truck! Is anyone in the market for a mid-sized pick-up truck? It’s been great to me over the years however it is time to move on from a single cab pick-up. About a month ago it broke down on the side of the road and I had to call towing in Madison, TN as I was stuck on I-65 North headed to Kentucky. What had happened is my clutch went out and the vehicle slowly started to loose speed. Luckily I was in the right-hand land, so getting over to the emergency lane was not an issue for me. It’s always super dangerous being stuck on the side of the interstate with cars passing upwards of 80 miles an hour. I’ve seen some bad accidents and one, in particular, was on the interstate involved a broken down Tahoe and a cherry picker. The cherry picker is one of those trucks that have a bucket on the top in order to reach electrical lines and such. It’s a utility truck, so pretty heavy duty. I’ll tell the story really quickly.

So I was heading towards Nashville from Kentucky early in the morning where the interstate was going through construction and had the emergency lane blocked off. A Tahoe had apparently stopped running and was broken down in the right-hand lane up against the concrete barrier, but still in an active lane. It did not have it’s emergency flashers on so I am guessing the battery was dead as well. I was driving in the far left land alongside a semi-truck in the middle lane to my right. To the right of the semi was the cherry picker up ahead of the semi. The cherry picker clipped the side of the Tahoe as it had no where else to go and rolled over sideways in front of the semi-truck, skidded across the road in front of us both. Immediately all I could smell was gasoline, and luckily the semi and I had time to stop before the slamming into the underside of the cherry picker. The driver of the wrecked vehicle was able to crawl out of the truck and hobble to safety. It was crazy! We all survived the accident and no one was hurt, thank goodness.

Thanks for reading, I will try and post again soon if find some time throughout the next few weeks.

Reminiscing farm life from my previous posts took me on a surreal trip to memory lane to living off grid in the mountains of Puerto Rico. Life was pretty sweet back then, the hard work on the farm added to the value. I’d like to talk about the set up we had out there as most people are not familiar with off-grid living. I mentioned I did some jobs for a plumbing company in Brentwood, TN before I went to the island and wish I had paid more attention to actually setting up a basic kitchen plumbing system. Most of what I did was the grunt work such as prepping supplies and routing out piping areas. Today a lot of power tools are battery charged such as routers, circular saws, band saws, drills, and so forth. With solar power on the farm, we could have done some serious work with basic power tools, however most of the work we did was with hand tools.

Finally, we are at the last post to this trilogy. We left off earlier with Reinaldo’s decision for a kitchen remodel, or addition rather than remodel. Prior to this I had not had any building experience but have been on a few construction sites with Brentwood plumbers in the past. Although this was a lot different as we were in the mountains of Puerto Rico with no electricity.

So throughout the first half of the day I was cutting grass with a machete and composting/mulching the fruit trees with the cut grass for nutrients. This practice not only helped maintain the property but also offered natural fertilizers to the crops. The second half of the day, Reinaldo and I would cut down trees for framing the the addition the his outdoor kitchen. The process was extremely strenuous involving many steps for prepping the logs before dropping them in their designated post holes. Here is the process we undertook: Continue reading “How I got introduced to construction Part 3”

We left off earlier in part 1 just as decided to take on the WWOOF experience is fly down to San Juan, Puerto Rico in search of hard work in exchange of food, shelter, and a bucket it excrete waste. Remember, this was my dream at the time, and I couldn’t wait any longer to achieve my goals. So I bought the ticket to San Juan. The first farm I had contacted was a youthful group of individuals who got together to buy some land and grow fruit trees and yams. They were a fun bunch of people from all over the world. The farm was in Patillas situated on the side of a mountain that you had to walk up in order to arrive at your destination. This is quite a feat when you are hauling up farm tools and beer. I understood immediately why they want as many volunteers as they could get. We were their donkeys, and we had to buy our own beer. I pitched a tent and slept until 4am every morning when the roosters started to crow. They were overwhelming. Every damn day.

It was a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away. I was on the Island of Puerto Rico working on a farm. Well, lets back up a little bit from there. So there I was, sitting in a classroom in Lexington, Kentucky grinding away at the University. I literally had no idea what I had planned for my future which is why I was studying agricultural economics! The best course I had there was futures markets which is trading crops that you didn’t grow.

Basically to sum it up, lets say you are going to buy some soy. So obviously the supply and demand plays a major factor in your return on investment. Soy is harvested in fall where it is high in supply, driving the price down. Thats when you want to buy. Supply is low in the spring and early summer which the last years harvest is running out. Thats when you want to buy. Anyways, 6 years in agricultural economics and thats what I have to share with you for your financial success. To your success!